Keeping the Blade
by the gothic gunslinger
Summary: What if Jeremy Downs didn’t die horribly at the end of Circle of Friends? What if Dexter decided to take him on as a student in the art of killing? What the rest of season 1 might have been like based on this concept.
1. Everything's Not Lost

**Keeping the Blade**

By the gothic gunslinger

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**Disclaimer:** Don't own Dexter or its fantastic characters. Do feel rather like Jeremy's mother, however, since I've given him way more time and attention than the writers of the show ever did. It's all about nurturing. You can't just callously throw these babyfaces aside!

**Author's Note:** This is somewhat of an offshoot of my first attempt, Murder By Numbers, if you've read that. That was more of a dumping ground for my character development for Jeremy, and I'm planning to make this a cohesive story, within the confines of the show Dexter and featuring the recurring cast.

**Synopsis:** What if Jeremy Downs didn't die horribly at the end of Circle of Friends? What if Dexter decided to take him on a student in the art of killing? What the rest of season 1 might have been like based on this concept.

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**1. Everything's Not Lost**

Jeremy Downs had dodged a motherfucking bullet. How, he had no idea.

But there was no denying it; he was living, for one, something he'd decided to stop doing only days earlier. Also, he was not in prison. That one was even more boggling to him. But here he was, back in the bright Miami sun, sweating in the humidity while wandering aimlessly through Flamingo Park. The park was possibly his least favorite place in the entire world, but he was so confounded by what had happened he'd come back out of habit and was now trying to piece it all together.

What had happened was this:

He killed the honor student. Yearbook editor, whatever. Was sloppy and got caught. Oops. Facing jail time, real serious jail this time, not the cakewalk that juvie ended up being. (Tattoo a bleeding skull on your neck and tell the kids in for shoplifting you killed someone over forty bucks earned you respect and fearful awe. Jeremy had never felt so empowered.) Then Dexter Morgan – Jeremy knew his name now, he was no longer That Freak Who's Stalking Me – showed up like a fucking ghost in the interrogation room and told him only to kill people who deserved to die.

Maybe Morgan should have been a little more specific at their last meeting, when he almost killed Jeremy in the rec room of Homestead Halfway House. But that night was still a confusing blur to Jeremy, riddled with confession, empty threats, and a revelation of Morgan's that he hadn't accurately shared with Jeremy. He simply acted like he'd found a soulmate, told him something about Lucas not deserving to die, and then: "Remember that, it could save your life one day." And then poof, gone. Good luck, Kid Who's Clearly as Fucked Up As I Am.

Back in Flamingo Park, a Frisbee flew over the reach of some college kid and nearly beaned Jeremy in the face. He leapt back on the path, heart pounding, startled out of his thoughts. The Frisbee faltered and fell to the grass nearby. Jeremy looked at the students. Both were girls, tan, skinny and blonde – like most of the girls in Miami. One of them yelled, "Sorry!" while mid-laugh.

Jeremy stared at them, then at the Frisbee. After a few seconds, it occurred to him that he should probably return it. He picked it up, stepped a little closer, and tossed it to the nearest girl. She caught it, started to thank him, then just stopped and stared, as if realizing she was looking at some kind of hideous monster. Jeremy pressed his lips together, turned and left without another word, face red with humiliation.

This was the downside to being locally infamous. No wonder he had no friends and sucked dick for a living.

Hands in his pockets and shoulders hunched, Jeremy switched directions and headed toward the lake, the seedier part of the park where you could easily buy weed and the Brokeback Boys were known to gather. He'd been staunchly avoiding the area, but now it was clear that's where he belonged. It's not like he had another choice, either. Now that he'd avoided a murder charge, he was back to serving out his five years of parole and living the next four months at Homestead so he could "readjust back to society." While being unable to find a straight job because of his felony conviction and the fact that his face kept appearing on the news.

Giving closeted faggots blowjobs for cash was never something Jeremy had dreamt of doing, and he'd fallen into it the way most of the Brokeback Boys had, due to desperation and more than a little deliberate misdirection. The leader of the prostitution ring, Raoul Madrid, Jeremy's pimp, if you were getting technical, routinely shopped through places like Homestead, looking for boys hungry enough for money that they were willing to do something shady. It was sold to Jeremy as drug muling, which was nothing to be proud of either, but at least your mouth wasn't places you never ever wanted it to be.

He should have asked more specific questions, but upon meeting Madrid he had been told, "You've got the look," which he had taken to mean a look of innocence – the main defense his public defender had come up with for his trial when he was fifteen. "Bat those dark lashes," Mr. Brown had said, "and they'll let you off easy." If four years in juvie for voluntary manslaughter was considered being left off easy, when you considered what the fucker had done to him first.

Regardless, Jeremy had showed up to the sleazy section of Flamingo Park when Madrid had told him to, realized he'd missed the movie reference of the title Brokeback Boys, and discovered "the look" wasn't the look of innocence so much as the look of youth (although the two did seem to go hand in hand). Madrid charged a hefty fee for his band of boy whores, because it turned out they were being marketed as underage, which would have upped the soliciting prostitution charge of the johns to statutory rape if caught. Most of them were actually underage, too, except Jeremy, but even on a good day he was aware he looked about sixteen, not nineteen. And, as it turned out, not many of his clients asked questions. If they did, he lied and was believed. Conversations never lasted long, because if Jeremy was talking it meant his mouth wasn't engaged in other ways more satisfying to the customer.

Why he did it, and not run away when he realized what he was in for like he should have, was, of course, the money. He'd decided he needed to get out of Miami, as soon as humanly possible. Never mind violating his parole; Jeremy just didn't care. If he stayed where he was he was going to end up dead, he knew it deep down in his bone marrow.

This was his mistake. He thought he could handle it. He thought if he only did blowjobs it wouldn't be as bad. (He wouldn't let anyone fuck him, not anymore. It was out of the question.) But every time he rolled a condom onto some gross businessman's cock, every time they pulled his hair so hard his eyes watered, every time they called him sweetheart, honey pie, good boy, Jeremy felt a piece of him die. Slowly, but steadily, with the same rhythmic precision applied with his mouth and tongue, he was being chipped away.

It got difficult to feel. He could punch a wall with his fist and the pain seemed insignifcant. He knew it was dangerous; it was the same numbness Jeremy'd had after the fucker did what he what did and before Jeremy had fixed it. But almost two months in he had a few grand saved and hidden, but he didn't know how to stop. He was always afraid he'd get to wherever he was going and run out before he could find a decent job, and it was better to keep going now than have to return to it later.

Then one day a recurring client finally got sick of Jeremy's refusal to submit to more than blowjobs and decided to take matters into his own hands. In the back of someone's company car, Jeremy realized the boundaries he set were worthless – if these men felt entitled to take they could act on it, and what could Jeremy do about it, exactly? Cry rape? It had been impossible to do the first time and he hadn't even willingly walked into the lion's den that time.

Luckily, he got out of it before much happened. His first instinct was to pull his knife, always lying in wait in the back pocket of his jeans, but being that they were in the parking lot of a public park at midday, logic spoke to him for once. Instead Jeremy kicked, punched, and managed to unlock the door before the guy could pin him down. He stormed away from the car, shaking from nerves, cheek swelling from the bitchslap delivered for being an "insolent punk." Apparently the john had wanted to teach him some manners. Whatever, he had a tiny dick.

Jeremy told Madrid that day he was quitting.

***

The Brokeback Boys were where they always were, lounging on a few sets of picnic benches in the wooded area by the lake, bodies contorted into subtly suggestive poses. Jeremy's stomach turned as he approached, unsure of what exactly he was going to say or do. Ask Madrid to come back to work? He could probably just start taking clients freelance, he'd had enough recurring ones, just tell the one who'd tried to take advantage of him to fuck off… that is, if anyone wanted their cock in the mouth of a boy just arrested for murder and then mysteriously released days later…

He was getting stared at again. Jeremy slowed to a stop as he reached the picnic benches and ignored the gaping gaze of half a dozen of his coworkers. "Is Madrid here?" he said, and only realized after he said it that he _was_ asking to come back to work after all. Pussy.

Shawn, a scrawny thing with long, dirty hair, said, "Jesus, man, where have you _been_?" The rest of them seemed very interested in the answer.

Jeremy held back a sigh; he'd been hoping none of them had seen him get arrested and were too busy getting high to read the news. "I was in some trouble but it's over now. Now where is he? He's usually around on Tuesdays…"

They started laughing, mirthless yet somehow still triumphant. Shawn said, "No, really. _Where_ have you been, Jer?"

Before Jeremy could ask him to elaborate, someone said, "Yeah, Madrid's gone!"

Jeremy stared. "What, gone? Where?"

"We dunno!" said Miguel, the youngest of the bunch at fourteen. His grin was manic. "He's wanted for murder, so we figured he split town!"

Jeremy felt ill all of a sudden. "What do you mean, murder? Who'd he kill?"

"I dunno," Shawn said. "Some goody-two shoes in an alley a few nights ago. They think he was trying to get him in with us and the kid wouldn't have it. Snapped and stabbed him to death. I always knew he was nutso."

"Muy loco," Miguel agreed.

"The police came and questioned us. We can all testify against him for forcing us into sex slavery if they find him. Isn't that awesome?"

"Now we can all charge whatever we want!"

Jeremy nodded numbly but said nothing. He needed to sit down.

***

After he quit, Jeremy's plan was to buy a bus ticket to anywhere and leave as soon as possible. He might have actually done it, too, but two days later he checked the hiding spot for the cash, a loose floorboard by the head of his bed, and realized it was gone. All of it. He had no idea who did it, but had a feeling whoever did already had a new stash of drugs to show for it.

That night he snuck out of the halfway house after curfew, found an alley, and waited. There wasn't much thought involved, he just did it. He wanted to feel something again, and the last time this had happened, blood had cured it. He didn't much care what happened to him after, either.

The next day, he went back to work. Madrid only winked at him when he showed up, and for a moment, Jeremy had wished he'd killed Madrid instead.

Then the police came, and he got busted. The rest was a blur of questions he refused to answer, Dexter Morgan's unexpected visit, the bad cop coming back and getting a few good punches in before his lawyer showed up. Mr. Brown, same public defender as last time. Jeremy knew he was fucked.

In the holding cell, he thought of Morgan's words, the mantra he seemed to have of only killing those who deserved to die. The kid had been an honor student, yearbook editor, MIT in the fall. Everything Jeremy wasn't. And now he was dead. And Jeremy still didn't much care.

He took that to mean that maybe he was the one who deserved to die.

A thin strip of metal pulled loose from his bed frame was sharp enough to do the trick, if applied at the right angle along the jugular. It would probably hurt, although not for very long. Feeling something vivid would be gratifying, actually, before what Jeremy hoped was a nice long sleep. He hadn't slept well in years.

He would have gone through with that, too, if about five seconds before he did the deed Dexter Morgan hadn't shown up outside his cell, took one look at him, and said, "What the hell are you doing?"

A few things ensued. One, Jeremy finally learned that the guy's name full name. He did work for the police, and yes, he was a killer. A killer who somehow felt responsible for Jeremy's plight. Which Jeremy didn't understand, because although Morgan claimed they were alike, all Jeremy saw was a guy well-manicured enough for the cover of GQ and a life that was helluva lot more together than Jeremy's was. He could tell Morgan had never blown anyone for cash just to survive.

Which, oddly enough, Morgan asked about. Started questioning him. Jeremy hadn't wanted to answer, still afraid this might be some twisted plan to get him to confess to something else, but Morgan had worn him down. So he told. About Madrid, and not really knowing what he was in for, and the driving, crippling need to get the hell away from this shit hole of a life.

What Morgan said surprised him. "No one," he reached over and grabbed Jeremy's arm for emphasis, "_no one_ deserves to lower themselves to that kind of level. Do you understand me, Jeremy? Not even you. Especially not you, because you're like me. Doing something like that makes it harder to see the lines we can't cross."

Jeremy still hadn't understood; in fact he was too busy trying to wriggle out of Morgan's grasp to really listen. He was released and Morgan banged on the bars to signal the guards to let him out. When Jeremy asked where he was going, all Morgan said was, "I'm a busy man. Just do me a favor and don't try to kill yourself again, Jeremy. Things have a way of working themselves out."

Again, Jeremy was dumbfounded, but for some reason, decided to listened to him.

Sometime the next day, the guards showed up, opened the doors to his cell, and told him he was free to go. When Jeremy asked why, they told him new evidence had surfaced, a witness had stepped forward, and he might be asked to testify at some point. Having absolutely no idea what they were talking about, Jeremy only nodded, took his clothes back so he could get out of the orange prison uniform, and after that was taken back to Homestead Halfway House, free as a bird who was still on parole.

***

Jeremy sat at the picnic table with the other Brokeback Boys, but instead of trying to pick up customers, he put his head in his hands and tried to make sense of it all. Obviously Morgan was responsible, he just didn't know how. The reality of it made his head spin. Morgan had saved his life.

"Hey there, cutie. I missed you."

Jeremy's head snapped up and he saw one of his old clients standing above him, practically salivating. Obviously there were lots of people not paying attention to the news – or maybe it was that the Ice Truck Killer was taking precedence in everyone's mind, since they brought him in on the same day they'd caught Jeremy.

He tried to tell the john, overweight and sweaty profusely in his suit, that he wasn't on the clock yet, but that's not what came out of his mouth. Instead he said, "I've raised my rates. It's a hundred bucks now."

He hoped partially to scare him off – it was a steep price for just oral. Standard rate was eighty, but that was when half went to Madrid.

But the client, who was apparently in awe of Jeremy's skill – the phrase "like a Hoover" was still lodged in his brain, making him nauseated whenever he thought of it – grinned jubilantly and said, "Get me off twice and it's a deal."

Jeremy wished he hadn't eaten breakfast, because he was suddenly certain he'd be seeing it again. "Got protection? I'm out."

"I am always prepared, baby doll. Always."

Jeremy nodded in resignation and stood, following the man like a listless helium balloon. The john had a favorite spot in the nearby mangroves, so he could jerk off while admiring the view of the lake. Tagging along while trying to look nonchalant, Jeremy fought an abrupt urge to cry. Bizarre whack jobs saving his ass aside, this was likely as good as it was going to get for him. Always down on his knees for one reason or another.

Just before they disappeared into the thicket of mangroves, Jeremy felt someone grab his arm and pull him roughly backward. He let out an involuntary noise of surprise, whirling to see a man in baseball cap and sunglasses, but Jeremy had seen Morgan enough times now to recognize him. "What the fu–?" he started to say, but the client, noticing the commotion, drowned Jeremy out with his indignation.

"Sorry, buddy, you're just gonna have to wait your turn!" he said pompously.

Morgan pulled out his Miami Metro laminated police badge. The john's face turned a spectacular shade of purple.

"I suggest you move along before you're both in trouble," Morgan said calmly.

Jeremy had never seen the fat bastard move so fast, which was at once awesome and infuriating. He turned to Morgan, glaring. "You owe me a hundred bucks."

"I owe you absolutely nothing. You, on the other hand, owe me quite a bit. And don't you ever listen? I told you not to lower yourself to this again." He began lugging Jeremy in the opposite direction.

Jeremy tried to pull away, but Morgan was stronger than he looked. "What the hell, man?"

"You're coming with me," Morgan stated, yanking him in the direction of the parking lot. "There are things we need to discuss."

"Yeah, like where my boss went?" Jeremy said.

"And why you're not facing a life sentence, Jeremy. But keep your voice down. Now I can let go and you can follow me like a civilized person, or I can cuff you and make this look like an arrest. Your choice."

Jeremy glared at him, unable to see the cold gaze he knew was behind the sunglasses, and stopped resisting. Morgan dropped his arm but looked ready to snatch him again if Jeremy tried to run.

They reached the parking lot and Morgan led Jeremy to his car. They got inside and Morgan turned on the ignition. Jeremy thought it was just for the air conditioning, but then Morgan pulled out of the parking spot and told him to fasten his seatbelt.

"Uh," Jeremy said, trying not to panic, "where are you taking me?"

"Nowhere in particular."

"This is kidnapping," Jeremy said.

"You got into my car of your own free will, didn't you?"

Jeremy shook his head. "I'll jump out."

"Of a moving vehicle? You'll just hurt yourself. Why you're so set on doing that, I don't know." He pulled out of the parking lot and headed for the freeway, almost out of spite.

Jeremy growled in frustration. "Where's Madrid?"

"I took care of him."

Jeremy wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. "You killed him."

"He was luring young, vulnerable boys into prostitution. He deserved it." He glanced briefly at Jeremy. "Don't you think so?"

"But… but… you pinned the kid _I_ killed on him." Jeremy couldn't believe this was happening. "How?"

"There are advantages to working in blood spatter, Jeremy," Morgan said. "They found the murder weapon in his house, with the victim's blood still on it."

"But you don't know where I put the murder weapon," Jeremy protested, wondering if Morgan was actually some kind of psychic ninja.

"No, I don't. So I invented one."

Jeremy blinked. "Oh. Oh. Fuck."

"These are the kind of things you can do when you think things through, Jeremy," Morgan said, voice oddly kinder than usual. "You'd do well to learn that."

"What, fuck with evidence so you can get away with murder?" Jeremy said flippantly.

Morgan turned to look at him. "Exactly."

Jeremy turned away from him, shaking his head and laughing mirthlessly. Outside his window, the view of the coast whizzed by. "This is unbelievable."

"Choose to believe what you want, but you're free, aren't you? The official report lists you as a witness to the crime because of the unfortunate evidence of your thumbprint at the scene, so they would ask you and the other witness to testify if they were ever to find Madrid. Which they won't."

"What other witness?" Jeremy asked. "I was alone that night."

"Not anymore. Your young friend with the guitar and short attention span at the halfway house will bear witness that you two were there together and saw the whole thing, but were too scared to report it."

Jeremy stared at Morgan for a few seconds until it clicked. "Jesus, _Devon_? That little shit's not my friend." He was one of the worst loudmouths at Homestead, the first to make cracks at Jeremy about being one of the Brokeback Boys.

"Two hundred bucks for marijuana has made him your friend now," Morgan said, then added thoughtfully, "I was actually expecting to have to give him more."

"Well, he's a moron," Jeremy said, putting his head in his hand. "And I can't believe you bribed him."

"You know, a simple thank you would suffice, Jeremy."

Jeremy sat in stunned silence for a minute before begrudgingly saying, "Thank you."

"You're welcome." He turned off the freeway. "Are you hungry? It's my lunch break and a pulled pork sandwich is calling."

Instead of answering the question, Jeremy said, "Why are you doing this?"

"I'll take that as a yes," Morgan said. "And I've told you, because you're like me."

"A killer."

"Yes."

"A _serial_ killer."

"Yes."

"How many people have you killed?"

Morgan stopped at a light and looked at Jeremy, slipping off his sunglasses so Jeremy could see the stone cold gaze. "Many more than you."

Jeremy couldn't keep the gaze and looked down. Morgan replaced the sunglasses and kept driving. When Jeremy didn't say anything, Morgan continued, "It's a lonely life, Jeremy. There's a lot of pretending. Pretending to feel, going through the motions, and killing provides the only release. It's not something you can chat about to your friends, tell your therapist – unless you kill him after." He chuckled, which gave Jeremy the chills. "There's no Serial Killer Club. We don't send each other Christmas cards. We operate independently of each other. But I, for one, have always wondered what it'd be like to have a – companion." He glanced again at Jeremy. "Do you see where I'm going with this?"

"You want us to be killing buddies," Jeremy said, honestly a bit appalled by the idea. He didn't kill for fun, he'd done it as a reaction to trauma and whatever high he'd gotten for it had quickly dissipated to feeling lower than he had beforehand.

"Not exactly," Morgan said. "You have much to learn. You were never trained like I was. My foster father, Harry, he recognized the darkness in me and helped me hone it from a young age."

Jeremy, although he didn't want to go along with the lunacy, couldn't help but respond to that. "You were a foster kid?"

Morgan nodded. "Yes. Like you. Except I was adopted by the Morgans when I was three. They're gone now – and no, I didn't kill them – but I'm still close with my sister, Deb. Or as close as I can be."

"How d'you I was in foster care?" Jeremy asked.

"I've read all about you, Jeremy. Abandoned by your mother at five, brought up in the system, never keeping a placement long term. Foster parents reported increasingly antisocial behavior. Stealing. Lying. And then, of course, the incident that put you in juvie."

"Fucker," Jeremy muttered. "He deserved it."

"Yes, he did. You stuck to the code with that one."

"Code?"

Morgan pulled into the parking lot of a fast food joint serving from a counter only. "I'll explain. First, lunch. Stay here. Is pulled pork okay or do you want something else?"

Jeremy was used to eating whatever was given to him, so he just nodded. When asked about beverage, he said root beer. Then Morgan left the car, still running for the air conditioning, with Jeremy alone in it. It was the same one he'd broken the window on to steal Morgan's wallet a couple months ago. He flirted with the idea of grand theft auto just for shits and giggles, but the truth was he didn't know how to drive. Morgan likely knew it too.

Within ten minutes Morgan was back, handing him a greasy sandwich and large cup slick with condensation. Jeremy didn't realize how hungry he was until he smelled it and was soon devouring it in the voracious manner with which most adolescent boys ate. Morgan ate more slowly, although not necessarily more neatly, holding the sandwich in one hand while tapping absently on the steering wheel with the other.

In between bites, Morgan explained the code, the mantra he had told Jeremy in the interrogation room: _Only kill those who deserve to die. _Trained to perfection by his father, Morgan's every moment was spent honoring the code. Jeremy had upheld the code with his first kill, but not with his second.

"Doesn't that mean I'm useless to you?" Jeremy asked. "You should just kill me."

"Thought about it," Morgan admitted. "But it's more my fault than yours. I could have helped you earlier. Instead you were forced into a horrible situation and lashed out like an animal. Which, and this is the last time I'm telling you, if you go back to prostitution again, I will just put you out of your misery."

"But I've got no money. In four months they're kicking me out of the halfway house and I'll be homeless. I can't find a real job—"

"Don't worry about it," Morgan said. "We'll work something out."

"We?"

"You don't seem to understand. This is me taking you on as my protege."

"Don't I get a say in the matter?" Jeremy retorted.

"Am I really worse than selling yourself to strangers?" Morgan asked, sounding genuinely curious.

Jeremy bit his lip and looked out the window. "No."

"I can't leave you alone again, Jeremy. You're attracted to trouble. You'll just kill again, sloppily as ever, and both your victim and you will be on my—" He stopped abruptly.

"Conscience?" Jeremy supplied for him.

"Haven't got one."

"Coulda fooled me."

Morgan took a bite of his sandwich and said through a full mouth, "Precisely."

Jeremy shook his head and finished the rest of his sandwich in silence. Morgan slurped noisily on the last of his drink. Finally, Jeremy broke and said, "So what do you plan to do with me? Take me along for a murder?"

"Yes."

Jeremy laughed. "And do you kill during the day? Because I've got a 9 p.m. curfew I have to meet every night at Homestead or they send me back to juvie."

"I'm working on it," Morgan said mysteriously.

Jeremy rolled his eyes. "Whatever, dude."

"Okay, first rule. You don't call me 'Dude.' You call me Dexter."

"Why not Mr. Morgan?" Jeremy asked. "Isn't that what kids are supposed to call their teachers?"

"Second rule, you drop the juvenile delinquency act. It gets old fast. You're not an angry fifteen-year-old anymore, Jeremy. You need to learn to act your age."

Jeremy fell silent, oddly embarrassed. "Sorry," he mumbled finally.

"It's all right. You don't trust me yet. It's fair enough, I have tried to kill you. But like it or not I'm currently the only person in the world who cares if you live or die, so you're just going to have to deal with it."

He took their trash and left the car briefly, throwing it in a nearby can. Then he plopped back in and backed the car out of the spot. "I'm taking you back to Homestead now. Do you think you can behave yourself until I contact you again?"

"How long's that gonna be?" Jeremy asked.

"Within the week. I promise."

"I guess so," Jeremy said. He was good at keeping his mouth shut and his head down when he wanted to be. "Do you like, have a phone number I can call?"

"Yes, but I'd prefer not to give it to you until I've figured out how to legitimize our relationship. These things take a little time. You're just going to have to try to trust me on this one."

"Fine," Jeremy said, a little surprised he was agreeing to it so easily. Still, it wasn't like he had any better options currently.

"Good." Morgan nodded. "Any questions?"

At first, Jeremy shook his head. Then something occurred to him, so he said, "Just one."

"Yes?"

"Why didn't you just spring the Ice Truck Killer instead? We even got caught on the same day. He seems like he's way closer to your league than I am."

Morgan actually smiled. "Because the man they caught is a fake, Jeremy. They haven't realized it yet, but he is. You're a lot of things, but a fake isn't one of them."

"I'm a real killer," Jeremy said, and saying it gave him a cold feeling in the pit of his stomach.

Morgan nodded, confirming it. "Yes, Jeremy. You're a real killer."


	2. Just Like CSI

Thanks to all who have read and reviewed. Keep 'em coming, I like knowing who's out there following my crazy little stories. :)

***

**2. Just Like CSI**

Jeremy sat in Homestead Halfway House's cafeteria, poking at soggy french fries and rereading the only book he owned – a battered copy of _Jurassic Park._ Next thing he knew, all five feet, five inches of Devon Patterson had sauntered over, enveloped in a marijuana haze. Jeremy tried his best to ignore him, despite that the moronic kid was looming, doing nothing but simpering in his general direction.

"Heeeey, Downs Goes Down."

The colorful pet name was what Devon considered the best of his arsenal, but Jeremy was no stranger to having bullies mutilate his name for a laugh. "Downs Syndrome" was a favorite of his peers in elementary school. But at least that hadn't been a title he lived up to.

"Don't you have a guitar to restring or something?" Jeremy asked without looking up. He was working very hard on being a non-threatening member of society until Morgan showed himself again – although at a week and a half since their last conversation and counting, his patience was growing dangerously thin.

What if Morgan – or Dexter, as Jeremy was supposed to call him now – had forgotten about him? Found the real Ice Truck Killer and decided he was more fun to play with? The possibilities were endless, making Jeremy look foolish for keeping up his end of the bargain, because at least sucking dick had given him an inflow of cash. He could be back to saving up for a bus ticket out of this shit hole, instead of sitting around reading a book he already had practically memorized just because it was better than staring at the wall.

"Nah, seeing what you're up to is way funnier," Devon said. "Get it? _Up_ to?"

Jeremy turned a page and didn't dignify him with a response.

"Besides, I'm supposed to tell you that your uncle's here."

"I don't have an uncle," Jeremy replied, thinking the kid must've gotten a bad bag with the bribe money Dexter had given him.

Devon laughed. "Sure you do. Hawaiian shirt, ironed pants, looks like he belongs in a bowling alley?"

For the first time, Jeremy tore his attention away from the book to stare at Devon. "You better not be shitting me."

"Nope, he's in Yvonne's office, waiting for you. Your 'Uncle Glenn.'" Devon cackled. "Is that what you call him in the bedroom?"

Jeremy stood immediately, closing his book, not even bothering to clear his tray on his way out of the cafeteria. "No need to thank me!" Devon called after him.

Yvonne Sweetnum was one of Homestead's half a dozen overworked and underpaid case workers, and had been assigned Jeremy when he was first let out of juvie almost three months prior. She was nice enough, but, like most of the social workers Jeremy'd had while in foster care, was simply stretched too thin to be of much use to him. Their weekly sessions consisted of her encouraging him to keep searching for jobs through a mouth full of lunch she was taking at her desk and while frantically scribbling notes in other kids' files. (Needless to say, she knew nothing of the unofficial employment he'd gotten in Flamingo Park.)

She was in her office, smiling sweetly at Dexter Morgan while they conversed in hushed tones. Jeremy stepped in, _Jurassic Park_ still in his hands, staring. Yvonne finally noticed him and turned to face him, dark skin colored with a blush. "Oh! Jeremy, there you are."

Morgan – no, Dexter, Jeremy was trying to get used to calling him – turned as well, looking the same as he always did, squeaky clean and well-dressed, and not like a murdering sociopath at all. Dexter gave him a bright smile and spoke with a cheer unfamiliar to Jeremy. "Hey there, champ!"

Jeremy raised his eyebrows in disbelief and gave Dexter a look as if to say _Champ?_, but the chilly glare he received in return forced him to play along fast. "Uh, hey… Uncle Glenn… long… time no see…"

Jeremy had no idea how this farce was going to work. He was sure Yvonne had all his case files from the foster system showing he had no known living relatives, and she couldn't be that blinded by Dexter's charms… right?

"It's so nice to see family reunited," Yvonne said. "Your uncle was just telling me how hard he looked for you after your mother disappeared with you as a small child."

"Poor Meghan," Dexter said, which made Jeremy flinch, since that had been his mother's real name. "I loved my sister, but she made a lot of poor decisions."

"It's too bad you weren't able to find him before he got into trouble," Yvonne said sympathetically, as if Jeremy's hefty four-year stint in juvie had been a brief timeout spent in his room.

"But I did still manage to visit," Dexter said, grinning at Jeremy.

Jeremy, who'd had absolutely no one visit him during his incarceration, said, "Yeah, it was nice to see you, Uncle Glenn." He hoped he was the only one who could hear the sarcasm dripping off his words.

"I'm so sorry I haven't been able to stop by before now," Dexter said. "I heard you got out, but I was overseas at the time."

"Iraq is such a mess right now," Yvonne said, straightening her hair. "It's so admirable you were over there, risking your life to get photos for the press."

"The work of a photojournalist is never done," Dexter replied, then grinned again at Jeremy and punched him lightly in the arm. "Thankfully, my assignments will all be local from now on. You ready to go, sport?"

"Go?" Jeremy echoed, more confused than ever.

Yvonne finally seemed to remember she was supposed to be doing her job and stepped between them, fixing Jeremy with the professional look he was used to seeing. "Jeremy, as part of your rehabilitation, your uncle Glenn has stepped forward to take you a few nights a week. I think this would be a good step for you, as I couldn't help but notice you've been floundering here without much outside support."

That was a kind way of referring to his recent arrest, but since he was now considered a key witness in testifying against the leader of a sex slavery ring, no one wanted to call him on it. Even the fact that he'd violated curfew had been overlooked.

"Uh," Jeremy said, glancing again at Dexter, who still looked as friendly and supportive as an Uncle Glenn should, "yeah. Sounds good."

"Great!" Dexter chirped. "Then if you'll excuse me, Yvonne, I've got to get this rascal out of here."

"Excellent, excellent," Yvonne said, sitting back at her desk, although she was still looking at Dexter with clear adoration. "You have my phone if there are any questions or concerns."

"He'll be an angel," Dexter said, fixing Jeremy with a pointed look. "I'll make sure of it."

Jeremy resisted the urge to laugh in his face.

***

They left the relative cool interior of Homestead side by side and were blinded by the Miami sun. Jeremy had his backpack slung over one shoulder, full of his few changes of clothes, toothbrush, and copy of _Jurassic Park – _everything he owned. After what had happened, he didn't trust the little shits at the halfway house not to steal anything he left behind.

As they walked to Dexter's car, Jeremy said, without looking at him, "Really nice of you to come, Uncle Glenn. The photojournalist."

"I told you I had to figure something out," Dexter replied, and his voice had returned to being as cold and uncaring as Jeremy remembered.

"I don't have an uncle Glenn," Jeremy said angrily. "And how dare you throw my mom's name around like you knew her? You know nothing about what happened to her, and you don't give a shit either."

"Keep your voice down," Dexter said, a smile fixed on his face. He reached out and pat Jeremy on the arm in what was supposed to be an uncle-y fashion. It took all of Jeremy's resolve not to twist away. "And you agreed to let me help you. You're in a difficult and precarious situation, Jeremy, which is entirely your fault, may I remind you. I've been doing the best I can."

He reached the car and unlocked it Jeremy stopped by the passenger side, hesitating before opening the door. Part of him wanted to bolt; this was never going to work, he was about to willingly go off to be murder buddies with a complete psycho. There would be no turning back.

"Get in the car, Jeremy," Dexter said, across the hood from him, watching him with an eerie calm.

"What if I don't?" he asked, sounding braver than he felt.

"Things won't end well for you," Dexter said simply, but with enough conviction to scare him.

Jeremy got in the car.

***

Dexter's place was small, but still nicer than any apartment Jeremy had spent time in. The place was spotless, the furniture classy, and the view of the water spectacular. After a brief tour (there was only one bedroom, so he would have to sleep on the couch), Dexter got a call from someone who was apparently his girlfriend, allowing Jeremy to wander out onto the balcony. The breeze from the ocean offered slight relief from the heat of the sun. It pulled back Jeremy's hair and made him feel a little calmer about being where he was. He leaned against the railing and watched the distant waves.

Eventually, he heard the sliding door open behind him. Jeremy turned and saw Dexter standing there, looking at him with a detached curiosity. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing," Jeremy said quickly, removing his hands from the railing and turning fully to face him. He swallowed hard, having a hard time looking him in the eye.

Dexter cocked his head, as if trying to understand the movement of a pet hermit crab. "Come inside."

Obediently, Jeremy followed along, back inside, where he sat down at the kitchen table as indicated. Dexter offered him food or drink but Jeremy was too nervous to accept either. He fidgeted with his hands as Dexter leaned against the counter and watched him closely again.

Even more anxious than before, Jeremy asked, "So how's this gonna work, then?"

Dexter pushed off from the counter and began pacing, as if he'd been waiting for Jeremy to approach he subject first.

"Well, for starters, you're going to spend three nights a week here, with me. I will pick you up on Thursday nights at 5:30 and return you on Sundays at 3 p.m. While you are at the halfway house you will be on your best behavior. Since it is clear you don't seem to know what good behavior is, this means no killing without my permission. There will be plenty of time for that, and I know the need, and your need will be satisfied, but NOT without my permission and assistance. Do you understand?"

"Yeah," Jeremy said, tracing imaginary lines on the table. This felt oddly similar to arriving at a new foster home, except the subject matter was quite a bit different. But the tone of authority was the same, and he always resented it.

"Good. You will also not violate your curfew, threaten anyone, or engage in any illegal activities, for money or otherwise. You're going to become a model citizen, Jeremy. That is imperative, or you're as good as dead. Do you understand that?"

"Yeah," Jeremy mumbled, letting the hair cover his face.

"Look at me and say it."

Jeremy pressed his lips together, raising his eyes to meet Dexter's. "I understand."

"Good," Dexter said, walking past him into the living room and snatching something off his desk. He returned and tossed a file onto the table in front of Jeremy. "Now here's your first homework assignment. Get reading."

Jeremy, caught off-guard, stared at the manilla folder inches from his hands. He grabbed it and opened it, coming face-to-face with a recent newspaper clipping about a woman organizing volunteer search teams for local missing children. There was a picture of her, Laura Whitney, smiling, with short blonde hair and a bland prettiness about her. She looked much like the humanitarian she was being written up for being.

"I don't get it," Jeremy said, after skimming the article.

Dexter tapped the picture of Whitney. "That's our next victim."

Jeremy ignored the half-sick, half-excited flutter in his stomach when he said _our_, not _my. _"But why? She like, helps people and shit."

"This is why you research," Dexter said, nodding at him to rifle through the other contents of the folder.

Jeremy did. There were six accounts of missing children, spanning the last three years, all of them eventually found by Whitney's volunteer organization throughout Miami-Dade County.

"I still don't get it," Jeremy said. "It just looks like her track record is pretty good."

Dexter sighed. "Keep reading. I've laid it all out simply."

Jeremy flipped through the remaining pages, but with Dexter looking intensely over his shoulder it was hard to concentrate. "Fuck if I know! I didn't sign up for CSI here!" He shoved the folder away from him, frustrated.

Dexter shook his head. "Actually, you did, Jeremy. You signed up for investigation, deduction, and much more." He took the folder and pushed it back in front of him. "And I told you to curtail the attitude, didn't I?"

"Yeah, well, it's hard to when you look at me like a fucking science experiment," Jeremy retorted.

"You haven't proved to be anything but that yet, Jeremy," Dexter said. "Now you agreed to this, so _focus_."

Jeremy was about to inform Dexter he could focus on fucking himself when the door to the apartment burst open and in flew a skinny woman in a pantsuit with long brown hair. Jeremy nearly yelped but managed to slam the folder shut and sit on it before the woman even glanced in his direction.

"Dex, you won't fucking believe the shit LaGuerta is trying to pull now—" she started, then halted, upon seeing Jeremy. "Who the fuck is this?"

"Deb. Have you ever heard of knocking? Or calling ahead?" Dexter asked, his voice changing again to sound fond yet impossibly exasperated.

"You took the day off. I thought you'd be home, you know, alone. Not with some kid." She crossed her arms. "Are you going to tell me what's going on, or what?"

Dexter sighed. "This is Jeremy. I'm sponsoring him through one of those Big Brothers Big Sisters type organizations. They got me at the office and now I'm helping him with his self-worth and academic future, okay?"

Jeremy had no idea how anyone was supposed to believe that explanation, but after it had left Dexter's mouth, Deb looked to Jeremy, her eyes wide with embarrassment. "Jesus, Dex, you should have told me! Poor kid, you probably think I'm some sort of cunt." She stepped forward and offered her hand. "I'm Deb Morgan, Dexter's far superior sister."

Jeremy hesitantly took her hand and shook it. Deb cocked her head at him. "You look a little familiar…"

"Uh, I get that all the time," Jeremy said quickly. "Something about my face being ordinary…" Foster parents had said something similar. _He'll never stand out in a crowd, will he? _Something about the brown hair, brown eyes, and babyface. Nothing terribly extraordinary about him. It was another contributing factor to getting the tattoo on his neck, which he hoped Deb would somehow magically not notice.

"Oh, don't say that. You're a cutie," Deb said, undoubtedly being kind, but the description was forever sullied by the gross men who had recently called him similar names and just made him feel queasy. "And hey, Dex can be kind of a dick sometimes, so if you don't think he's being particularly human about something, you can come to me, okay? I'll kick his ass."

Confused, Jeremy nodded. "Um, thanks."

"You're welcome. Now would you mind giving me a few minutes alone with my prick of a brother?" Deb asked.

Jeremy glanced at Dexter, who nodded. Awkwardly, Jeremy stood, trying to keep the folder out of sight, and went back into the living and out onto the balcony. He needn't have worried, though, because Deb was far too focused on her brother. Once outside, Jeremy slid down the wall to sit on the deck floor, grasping the murder folder for dear life, trying to catch his breath.

Unfortunately, being out on the balcony didn't mean Jeremy was out of earshot.

"Dex! You sponsor an underprivileged kid just like that and don't tell anyone?" Deb demanded, full of unexpected emotion. "That's completely unfair, especially to poor Jeremy! Kids like him need a lot of attention and compassion. You can't even care enough to keep a goldfish alive!"

"Hey, I have compassion. When I heard his story I couldn't ignore it. He's a lot like me, Deb."

Jeremy, scowling, shook his head and tuned out the rest of their conversation. It had something to do with the faux Ice Truck Killer who had been arrested – the detective named LaGuerta didn't think he was the guy either, but the DA was going ahead with the case, blah blah… severed heads were involved…

With lack of anything better to do, Jeremy turned back to the folder in his hands, determined to prove that he wasn't completely useless and Dexter shouldn't just drop him off at the park on the way back so he could go back to whoring.

An undetermined amount of time later, he heard Deb call out a goodbye to him and the front door close. Seconds later Dexter appeared in the doorway, looking down at Jeremy with a raised eyebrow. "You charmed Deb already, but don't pat yourself on the back quite yet. She's the kind of person who can't walk by a pet shop without cooing at the fuzzy things inside the window for at least half an hour."

"Sounds like she's in the wrong job," Jeremy said, still looking through the articles.

"That's one of my sister's many mysteries," Dexter said. "Are you going to get up off the floor or what?"

"I think I understand what you were trying to get me to see," Jeremy said, ignoring him.

This seemed to pique Dexter's interest. He perked visibly, eyebrows raised, waiting for Jeremy to continue.

"You put in the addresses Laura Whitney's lived in the last three years. She moves a lot… and it means she's lived within a few blocks of the last six kids that her organization found at the time they went missing." He looked up at Dexter, squinting at him in the bright afternoon sun. "There's a reason she knows where to find them, isn't there?"

Dexter grinned. "Congratulations, Jeremy, you've earned yourself dinner." He offered Jeremy a hand. "Steak."

Jeremy took his hand and stood, feeling strangely accomplished. Maybe he was good for something after all.

***

The couch was decent in terms of comfort, but Jeremy had definitely slept on worse. The main issue was his feet, since he was just barely too tall for the length of the sofa. Eventually he got into a position where it wasn't an issue, and proceeded to lie awake for over an hour after they had gone to bed. He had never been a sound sleeper. Over time, with less than pleasant events piling up in his psyche, it had simply gotten worse.

It seemed like he had finally reached a comfortable level of dozing when someone shook him awake. Jeremy's eyes snapped open and he found himself staring into Dexter's face. For a moment, he thought he'd been tricked all along, and this was when he was getting stuck with a needle for real this time. But Dexter moved away and watched him expectantly. When Jeremy didn't move, he said, "Come on, get up."

"Why?" Jeremy asked, groggy. He glanced at the clock on the TV set. Almost 2 am.

"It's happening tonight," Dexter said, voice raspy.

The way the guy seemed to switch personalities in his tone of voice only was totally creepy, Jeremy started to realize.

"The fuck? Just like that?" Jeremy asked, sitting up and rubbing an eye. "You could've warned me."

"I had to check to make sure circumstances permitted it," Dexter said, offering no further explanation. "Now get dressed. We're leaving in ten minutes."


	3. Death and All His Friends

**3. Death and All His Friends**

By the age of nineteen, Jeremy Downs had done plenty of unsavory things. Shoplifting. Drug experimentation. Time in juvie. Low-level prostitution. Even what some would call grisly murder. Still, hauling an unconscious woman into an abandoned warehouse by the feet while his accomplice carried her arms was on another level entirely from all his other transgressions.

"Close the door," Dexter ordered in a hushed voice when they got Laura Whitney inside.

Jeremy, who was working as diligently as he could at keeping his heart from exploding, was slow to obey, mostly because he'd caught a glimpse of the room Dexter had prepared for them. Plastic tarp everywhere. A table in the middle lit with an overhanging fluorescent bulb. A table the woman wouldn't be leaving alive.

"Jeremy!" Dexter hissed, making him jump. Dexter had paused in hauling Whitney over his shoulder to glare at him. "Wake _up_!"

Jeremy couldn't articulate that he was as awake as he could be. He was just terrified. He turned and ran back to the door, pausing to look out at the parking lot. The only light was one flickering street lamp at the other end of the pavement. No one had followed them. He took several deep breaths and slammed the door, which locked when it met with the frame. Hands sweating inside the latex gloves Dexter had given him ("You know what tripped you up last time? A thumb print"), he walked back to the scene of the crime.

"N-no one's there," Jeremy reported, staring as Dexter stretched the woman out on the table. Her arms had fallen the edge and she looked like Christ on the cross in churches Jeremy used to be forced to go to when his foster parents were of the religious sort. Usually Cuban families, they were always so damn Catholic.

At first, Dexter didn't appear to hear. Then he said gruffly, "Help me undress her."

Jeremy stared. "Wh-what?"

"I _said_—"

"I heard what you said," Jeremy cut in, backing up, eyes going huge as he realized he might be in the presence of someone more vile than he'd counted on. "I-I didn't know you were into _that_—"

Dexter strode over to him and seized him by the arm, which only caused Jeremy to panic – he hated being touched or grabbed, especially by men. He instinctively tried to pull away but Dexter held strong. He must have seen the animal look in Jeremy's eyes because he said, "Jeremy, calm down. Calm down and look at me."

Jeremy didn't want to. But with some effort he dragged his gaze from the concrete floor to the cold irises of the man next to him.

"I'm not 'into' anything you're thinking. It's messier with clothing, and any amount of fibers left on the body can help law enforcement pinpoint a suspect. It's practical. Do you understand me?"

Slowly, chewing his lip, Jeremy nodded. Dexter released him.

"Now are you helping me or should I give you something else to do?"

Jeremy looked from Dexter to the unconscious woman, blond hair half covering her face. She was older, but not bad-looking, certainly prettier in person than the bland photos of her from various media outlets. He imagined undressing her and the color rose to his cheeks. He didn't want to admit that he'd never seen a naked woman in person before.

"What else can I do?" he asked finally.

Dexter nodded, then walked over to his bag and pulled out a stack of grainy photos and some tape. "Put these up around the room."

Jeremy glanced at them and recognized them immediately. The pictures used in the news for all of Whitney's missing children. "What, are we giving her some sort of presentation?"

"I like them to be able to reflect on what they've done before it ends," Dexter said simply, and walked back over to the table to attend to Whitney.

Jeremy swallowed hard and got to work putting up the photographs. About halfway through the stack they went from being school pictures of smiling children to piles of bones found in the ground. The switch probably should have affected Jeremy more than it did, but he was a little distracted by seeing how many bones he could identify. He tried to remind himself it was Laura Whitney's handiwork, half a dozen innocent children slaughtered, and they were doing society a favor by getting rid of her. Monsters killing monsters.

When Jeremy finished taping the last photo to the hanging tarp, he turned around to tell Dexter and promptly forgot to speak. In that short span of time, Dexter had stripped Whitney naked and fastened her to the table with an extraordinary amount of plastic wrap, covering all private areas but ensuring there was no room to move. A piece of tape covered her mouth, which was probably a good thing because she was starting to stir. Dexter stood by, readying what looked like surgical instruments.

The full reality of the situation hit Jeremy at that moment, a truth which had been gnawing at the back of his mind since he had watched Dexter disappear into Laura Whitney's house with a very familiar-looking hypodermic needle.

This was what Dexter had been planning to do with him.

Jeremy tried to swallow again, but his mouth had a chalky taste and it was difficult to get his muscles to obey. What if he hadn't mouthed off to Dexter that night in the rec room? What if he'd taken it silently the way he'd taken most other horrors that came his way? Dexter never would have known he hadn't killed the fucker just for fun. And it would be him on the table, eyes giant now like plates, looking about wildly at what was surely to be a gruesome fate.

"Get behind me," Dexter said quietly to Jeremy. "Don't speak. And don't touch. You're just watching this one."

Whitney was trying to scream, but with the gag it just came out as a muffled moan. Jeremy felt rooted to the floor, transfixed by terror.

"Jeremy, _now_."

Jeremy ripped his feet from the spot and hurried behind Dexter, his head feeling light and his chest impossibly heavy, like a rhino had decided to take a nap on it. He could still see Whitney, who had started to cry. Dexter stepped forward, making her cower. He began speaking in a hushed voice, quickly and with ruthless monotone, too fast for Jeremy's panicked brain to follow. He did hear the words _You're mine now_, another phrase Dexter had said to Jeremy, whispered in his ear with his arms held behind his back, face pressed into the column against which he was pinned.

The muffled moaning had begun again, tears sliding from the corners of her eyes into her hair. She turned and looked past Dexter, saw Jeremy and her gaze widened again. Jeremy stared back, unable to look away.

"Let her talk," Jeremy said suddenly, voice cracking at the worst moment as it always did, making him seem dismissively adolescent.

Dexter turned to glare at him, a scalpel in one hand. "What did I say about speaking?"

"She wants to say something," Jeremy said stubbornly, despite how hard his heart pounded in his ears. "Let her talk."

Dexter suppressed a sigh and ripped the tape off the woman's mouth. "Thirty seconds."

Whitney hawked up phlegm and spit it in Dexter's face. "_Fuck you_! You bring your kid along with you to watch you murder people? And you're saying I deserve to die? I saved those children! They were from broken homes! They're safe now!" Her gaze slid to Jeremy. "I could've saved you, sweetie. You're too big now, but I could've, if you were younger…"

Dexter put the tape back on her mouth. "He's not my child."

Jeremy felt sick, stomach all twisted up inside from Whitney's words. He was going to say something else, but then Dexter stepped forward and sliced open her cheek with his scalpel and everything sort of stopped. Red blossomed and trickled toward her ear and Jeremy could do nothing but watch. It was beautiful, and the sight of it immediately calmed him. He had the terrible desire to use the knife, hidden in his back pocket, to make more lines of blood appear on her white skin.

By now, however, Dexter had taken a small bit of the blood and put it on a glass slide. Then he put the slide down on the side table and picked up some sort of power tool. Jeremy's awe turned to horror as he realized what was coming next. The machine made a ghastly whirring noise, and the blade would surely spray blood everywhere, not in the few controlled fountains caused by severing arteries.

And limbs. Body parts would be everywhere. He was going to dismember her, like the fucking Ice Truck Killer.

The rotating blade met flesh and the muffled screaming started with real power now. Jeremy couldn't watch this, it was overkill. It was gaudy and gross and—

He turned and ran, out of the warehouse, into the dark parking lot, over to a tree that had begun cracking the asphalt with its roots. There he threw up the steak Dexter had fed him for dinner. When he was done, the Miami sky opened up and dumped rain on him, as if to say, _Yeah, this is what you've gotten yourself into. Congratulations. _

He didn't dare go back inside. He waited under the tree, his hair saturated and hanging in his face, so that he now resembled a sheepdog. His clothes and socks were soaked through within minutes.

What seemed like an eternity later, the warehouse door opened and Dexter came out, carrying his duffel bag and a garbage bag. Jeremy tried not to think of what was in the garbage bag, lest his stomach rebel again. The rain was letting up, so he probably looked extra comical as he walked, dripping wet, to meet Dexter at his car.

Dexter put the bags in his trunk, then looked up and saw him. "I'm surprised you're still here."

Jeremy shrugged. "Where would I have gone?" It was a bad part of town, and while he had an idea of how to navigate it, there would have been nothing for him to do besides sleep on a park bench or find someone to offer services to.

Dexter pulled a fresh towel out of his bag and threw it to him. "Dry off before you get in, you'll ruin the upholstery."

Jeremy toweled off and wrung out his hair and got in the passenger side. Dexter pulled out of the parking lot and headed back toward the highway.

"Where are we going?" Jeremy asked.

"My boat."

"You have a boat?"

"It was my father's. It comes in handy for disposing bodies."

There was a dismembered corpse in the trunk. Jeremy closed his eyes. "That lady was crazy."

"It's why I didn't want to let her speak. Some of them can't even comprehend their monstrous nature. They're slaves to it."

"Would you have let me speak?"

Dexter frowned and glanced at him. "What do you mean?"

"If you'd gotten me strapped to a table naked, would you have let me tell you I killed the fucker because of what he did to me?" Jeremy swallowed thickly. "Or would you have just chopped me into pieces?"

Dexter was silent for almost a full minute. "I don't know."

Jeremy let out a bitter laugh. "Awesome."

"It doesn't matter, Jeremy. You spoke when you did. I understood and spared you. Laura Whitney wasn't killing children because they deserved it."

"She thought she was helping them," Jeremy pointed out.

"She was mistaken."

"She probably should've been in a mental hospital."

"When she got out, she would have just done it again," Dexter said.

"Maybe."

"Likely."

"But not 100%." Jeremy shook his head. "What if there have been others like me who didn't fucking speak up?"

"Not likely," Dexter said.

"But also not 100%!" Jeremy said, exasperated. "You're trying to make this thing into an exact science, man, but it's not. How can you be absolutely certain all of them deserve it? How many other mistakes like me have you made?"

"Are you looking to back out?" Dexter asked calmly. "Are you looking to return to your illustrious job in Flamingo Park?"

"No," Jeremy said icily, crossing his arms.

"Your logic is flawed, Jeremy. You've already killed an innocent. You don't have the luxury of poking holes in my methods." He turned the car onto the highway. "It's not an exact science, no, but it's all we've got. Do you understand?"

Jeremy pressed his lips together and sighed. "I'm not chopping people into pieces when it's my turn. That shit's nasty."

Dexter shook his head. "You're a peculiar boy, Jeremy."

Jeremy snorted. "Not the first time I've gotten that, thanks."

They were quiet the rest of the drive, all the way to a swanky marina where yachts floated on black water, waiting for their owners to take them out for a Sunday stroll. Jeremy and Dexter were the only ones there, thankfully. Jeremy had never been on a boat before, since people who took in foster kids rarely had much money to kick around. He sat near the front while Dexter drove them far offshore and then stalled the engine, grabbed the garbage bag, and threw it overboard. Jeremy thought he was just going to turn the boat around immediately, but instead he sat down next to Jeremy and they sat in silence for a while, letting the salty wind hit their faces.

"You didn't do poorly," Dexter said finally.

Jeremy laughed mirthlessly. "I taped up pictures. That was about it."

"It wasn't supposed to be a test. I just wanted you to see how it was done."

"Well, I saw." Jeremy sighed.

"And?"

"And I dunno. It's not what I expected."

Dexter raised an eyebrow. "What did you expect?"

Jeremy shrugged. "I don't think I can cut up bodies, man. Or strip anyone naked. That's just…" He shuddered.

"We'll figure it out," Dexter said.

Jeremy shook his head. "You're being a lot nicer to me than I thought you'd be."

"I'm capable of being nice," Dexter said. "You just seem like the type to need tough love."

"Tough love," Jeremy repeated, pushing some hair out of his face. "So are you trying to be my dad or not?"

Dexter frowned. "I don't understand."

"The lady thought I was your kid. You had no problem correcting her. Now you're sitting here saying we'll figure it out and I need tough love. What the hell am I to you?"

Dexter cocked his head. "I'm not sure. Harry was my mentor when it came to teaching me how to kill. Maybe it's subconscious. He and I used to go out in this boat and talk about it. It helped me. Maybe it can help you."

Jeremy wasn't entirely sure what to say to that. "He still around? Your dad?"

"No, he died of a heart condition ten years ago."

"I never met mine. Not even sure who he was. Or is. My mom told me he died in the Gulf War, but … it's hard to believe someone who leaves you in a McDonald's bathroom when you're five."

Dexter said nothing for a minute. "I'm sorry things have been hard for you, Jeremy."

Jeremy squinted at him in the dim light. "Are you really?"

"Yes."

"I thought you didn't have emotions."

"That doesn't mean I can't understand them and act accordingly."

Jeremy shook his head, grinning wryly. "You know what I think? I think you feel more than you think you do."

"Why's that?"

"I dunno. You act all tough and then you slip up sometimes. I do it too. You try not to give a shit to protect yourself and then you do it anyway. Why do you think I have this stupid tattoo on my neck?"

Dexter stood up. "It's nice of you to say, but I can't agree with you." He went to the wheel and began to turn the boat around and head for shore. "Let me ask you something, though. Have you had any urges to kill lately?"

Jeremy thought of the moment he had seen the blood on Laura Whitney's cheek, although the urge had been squashed by the dismantling of the woman's body. He told Dexter as such. "But it's gone now."

"It'll come back, as I'm sure you know. When it does, tell me. Like I said, we'll figure it out. But that's not the kind of thing I want you keeping from me, okay? I want to avoid a repeat of last time."

Jeremy nodded. "All right."

It was the first time he thought things might work out between them.

***

**Author's Note:** Sorry it's a bit shorter than usual, but it seems like the kind of thing that needs to stand alone. ^_^ Thanks to everyone who's not only reviewed, but put this story on their alerts and favorites. It's getting a lot more attention than I thought it would and I'm happy to see there are that many Jeremy fans out there. (I thought I was the only one, srsly.)

As always, feel free to drop me a line via review or whatever if you like what you see. Thanks and stay tuned!


	4. Domestic Nonviolence

A/N: Sorry about the delay. I'm doing a lot of writing in my grad program, so that's kept me busy. There's always time for Jeremy, though. ^_^ Again, thanks to all the readers! This fic is quite a bit more popular than I thought it would be. I'm so happy I'm not alone in the Jeremy love. :3

Speaking of, his actor, Mark L. Young, has been on the last couple episodes of Heroes, playing a character of the same name. (And the same fate, more or less. Poor Jeremy, no matter what universe he's in, he can't catch a break.) I found to this be totally amusing (and horrifying D:), and it was the first thing to get me to watch Heroes in a long time…

Aaanyway, onward!

**4. Domestic Nonviolence**

The urge to kill was not as easy to pinpoint as Dexter claimed. For him, it seemed something that arose like clockwork; Jeremy imagined he looked at his watch every two weeks on a Wednesday night at 6:30 and said, _This is it_. Or something to that effect, anyway.

For Jeremy, it was nothing he consciously understood. He spent four years in juvie without the slightest desire to recreate the carnage he had created in that South Miami park when he was fifteen. The fucker had gotten what he deserved, Jeremy was doing his time for it, that was it. He had never wanted to make a career out of it.

But release him back to society and things had started to get fuzzy. He wasn't sure if anyone could understand what it was like, in a halfway house full of kids busted for possession of weed, for shoplifting, biding their time before they went back to mooching off their parents and doing exactly what they had been doing to get them busted in the first place. Even in a place like that, where he was supposed to be on an even keel with everyone else, he was alone. He was older than them, he was homeless. He had killed someone, see the tattoo on his neck? That was his trophy.

Everyone expected him to be worse than he was, and when he wasn't, he became something of a joke, even before the prostitution thing cropped up. No one knew what to do with him, no one cared. So he didn't care either. That was where it started, in a wandering mind, someone with no anchor, it began like an itch in the back of his brain and grew, without Jeremy even realizing it. Like cancer. Next thing he knew he had bought a knife and was leading some kid through a swamp and still it hadn't dawned on him exactly what he was doing. Not until Dexter had jumped in, scared them both shitless had he realized and been angry enough to break a car window and steal a wallet from the glove compartment just to get some fucking release.

And the kid in the alley, of course, had just been frustration, pure and simple. But Jeremy didn't want to think about that, or the events leading up to it, ever again.

But how to put a finger on the very moment he started craving blood? Did junkies know the precise moment they needed another fix? From his experience with them, things just compounded before they were aware and suddenly they were so desperate they'd do anything to get high. Dexter wanted to avoid getting to that point with Jeremy, so he had to be hyperaware of himself, a self he had never been comfortable being. It wouldn't be easy.

Then there was the four days during the week he was back at Homestead, with kids calling him Downs Goes Down and without the man who was ready to seize him at any moment and drag him away from doing something stupid. He had Dexter's cell phone number, some quarters, and the promise he'd be right there in the case of an emergency. Would that really be good enough? At least Jeremy had gotten rid of his knife, the weapon that had done in the Kid in the Alley. Not that he couldn't buy another in a flea market for another fifteen bucks. If he had fifteen bucks. Which he could earn fast, but in no way he wanted to.

He went to the library.

The Miami Beach Branch Library was big, air conditioned, and didn't mind all day loitering if you had books you were reading. They also had internet, something Homestead felt was fine to deprive their charges, who would just be going back to wireless broadband in their parents' houses in a month anyway. Jeremy used an old school ID from before juvie to get himself a library card and started taking books with him when he left. He figured an idle mind got him into trouble to begin with, so if he had something to focus on a daily basis, maybe – well, maybe he wouldn't feel the need to kill again. Or maybe, at least, it would be easier to tell when his mind started to wander to darker places.

Jeremy was not, by his own admission, a very avid reader. _Jurassic Park_ was the only book he had bought for himself, and that was mostly because of the lifelong obsession with paleontology the movie had awakened in him. One of the few memories he had of living with his mother consisted of watching the movie on TV, surrounded by dinosaur action figures, while she… Where was she? In the bedroom, probably, getting high with her boyfriend, but that was the adult Jeremy adding logic to the childhood memory. He did that from time to time, although that was nothing he liked to dwell on, either.

The point was, while not being terribly transfixed by fiction, Jeremy liked the science of things. Paleontology, astronomy, marine biology – at one point he had been certain he wanted a career as a scientist in one of these fields. Before juvie, of course, before he started looking things up and realized how expensive it was just to get a bachelor's degree in anything he really wanted to do. Now the Miami Beach Library carried just as many nonfiction books as fiction books, so he settled for the reachable goal of not letting himself get bored enough to kill anyone and checked out ten books at a time.

Still, it was a confused yet intrigued look he received when Jeremy got into Dexter's car on a sweaty Thursday afternoon and pulled out Stephen Hawking's _A Brief History of Time _to read on the ride back to Dexter's place.

"You're into astrophysics?" Dexter asked.

Jeremy shrugged and flipped a page. "Have to fill the time somehow now that I'm not whoring."

Dexter shook his head and started the car. "I knew you were smarter than you look."

***

Strictly speaking, although he was at Dexter's, Jeremy still spent a decent amount of time alone. On Friday Dexter worked, Friday night he went out with his girlfriend, so Jeremy was glad he had given himself the project of expanding his knowledge of areas that weren't related to serial murder. On Saturday they went over details to Harry Morgan's code and Sunday they did something almost disturbingly father and son-like, such as fishing, or watching the Dolphins game, which Deb showed up for with beer, forgetting Jeremy was underage. It was bizarre, and it almost hurt as much as he enjoyed it, because it had been so very long since he had experienced anything like it. The old foster kid fear was still present in the back of his mind; one wrong move and he was gone. If he fucked up and killed someone else who didn't deserve it, he was certain Dexter would be done with him. Probably with plastic wrap and a needle to the neck. (Yet another thing he didn't want to think about.)

After a few weeks of this routine, Dexter returned home on a Friday evening, citing he was taking a shower before meeting Rita for their date. While in the bathroom, his cell phone rang, and from where Jeremy sat at the kitchen counter could see the letters of Rita's name glowing on the front. His first instinct was to answer it, but he wasn't sure if Dexter had told his girlfriend about the underprivileged kid he was sponsoring, so thought better of it. He pointed it out when Dexter emerged from the shower and sat watching as Dexter called her back.

The sitter for Rita's kids was sick and had to cancel was the gist of it. Jeremy could hear her voice through the phone, she sounded sad and a little overwhelmed. Dexter was in the middle of saying they should reschedule for the beginning of next week when Jeremy said, "I can do it."

Dexter blinked at him, as if noticing he was there for the first time.

"I've babysat kids before," Jeremy said, and he had. It was one of the most popular reasons to take in teenage foster children. That and a free housekeeper. "It's easy."

"I… think I might've just found a replacement," Dexter said to Rita. "Remember the boy I'm sponsoring? He's here right now … totally trustworthy," he confirmed, giving Jeremy a stern look as he spoke. "Great. We'll leave in a few minutes. See you soon." He hung up and narrowed his eyes at Jeremy.

"What?" Jeremy said.

"Why would you volunteer for something like this?"

Jeremy shrugged. "Maybe because I'm not paying rent? You've been doing me all the favors lately, I might as well try to return one here and there."

Dexter seemed to be weighing the pros and cons of the situation, then said, "I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell Rita that I'm letting an ex-con watch her children."

Jeremy rolled his eyes. "Because that's a fact I so proudly flaunt to everyone I meet."

"All right, wiseass, get in the car."

***

Rita Bennett's house wasn't big but it was cozy; it felt like a home, more so than Dexter's pristine apartment. Rita herself was a sweet little blond, who smiled often but just as hesitantly as Jeremy did. Something haunted her, he could tell right away. He had spent enough time as a broken spirit to know.

Astor and Cody were cute but much too quiet. They too reminded Jeremy of himself. They were used to upsets and trauma, of being afraid to make noise or the anger would be turned on them. No one mentioned where their father was. Jeremy knew better than to ask questions.

Bed time was 8:30, pizza had already been ordered. Rita asked Jeremy what he charged and he gave her a horrified look until he realized she meant for watching the kids. He sputtered something about not needing to be paid but she insisted on at least $10 an hour, like she gave their regular sitter. It sounded absurdly low and wonderful at the same time. He finally pressed his lips together and nodded, hoping she didn't notice how pink in the face he was getting. His former coworkers used to tell him he'd never want to go back to a straight job, not after knowing how much his mouth could earn him. Now the innocence of his sittees and the paltry pay that accompanied it was nearly enough to dissolve him into relieved tears.

When Dexter and Rita left, they played chutes and ladders while munching pepperoni pizza in the living room. Jeremy let himself lose. Then Astor put on CNN and appeared to be genuinely interested in what was going on. Cody asked him where he got his neck tattoo.

"Friend of mine," Jeremy said, which was only a slight stretching of the truth. "He was learning." Also fact. Enrique had been planning to go to work in his brother's tattoo parlor when he got out of juvie for drug possession.

Cody nodded solemnly, believing the story with the intensity of a seven-year-old. "Well, it's _badass_!"

Jeremy struggled not to laugh but Astor turned away from the TV and scolded, "Cody, we're not supposed to swear."

"Sorry, but it is!" Cody said, then scrambled off the couch to find his Legos.

Jeremy decided he liked them both.

The kids more or less put themselves to bed when it was the designated time. Jeremy made sure they were comfortable and didn't need anything and then flopped back on the living room couch, the news still droning on the television. Although it was early, he felt tired enough to sleep, a rarity. There was also an odd feeling inside him, which took him awhile to pinpoint. It was something like contentment. He tried to remember the last time he felt that way. At least a decade. At least.

He must have started to doze because suddenly he was jerking awake, heart hammering, as someone pounded on the front door. Jeremy blinked blearily, searching the unfamiliar room for a clock to tell him what time it was. Five past nine. Much earlier than Dexter and Rita's estimated time of arrival. Despite his hesitation, the knocking continued undeterred.

Jeremy stood and stumbled a bit on the way to the door. By the time he opened it and found himself staring at a tall blond man with a bowl cut he was fully awake. Strange men made him nervous, especially when it looked as though they could overpower him. This man was taller than him, with well-muscled arms covered in tattoos looking as crudely drawn as Jeremy's own. He already had a bad feeling he knew where this was going.

"Can I help you?" he asked with as much authority as he could muster. He could tell the guy was sizing him up as a pitiful opponent, and oftentimes the deepness of Jeremy's voice was the only indication that he was closer to twenty than ten.

Ignoring his question, the man demanded, "Who the hell are you?"

"I'm the sitter," Jeremy replied, equally flippant. At least there they were evenly matched. "Who the hell are _you_?"

"I'm the father," the man said. "Paul Bennett. You're not the normal sitter."

"She's sick. I'm a replacement. Look, Astor and Cody are already asleep, and Rita's not here, so can I just take a message or something?"

Paul Bennett's smirk and the way he leaned into the doorway made Jeremy nervous, added to the fact that no one had mentioned his existence. It gave Jeremy the overall impression that Bennett was not welcome here.

"Dammit, kid, can't a man see his own children?" Bennett cried, pounding the doorframe with his fist, making Jeremy jump.

It was also the first time the outside light really illuminated Bennett's face and Jeremy could see how sweaty it was. A second later he caught a whiff of something alcoholic. Whiskey, maybe. Jeremy swallowed hard; drunks were another variety of people he didn't like. Too unpredictable in their actions, and so many of them turned mean. He'd had a foster parent or two with that particular failing.

"I think you should leave," Jeremy said, trying not to look intimidated. Show a moment of vulnerability and people like Paul Bennett seized it. "I don't think you wanna make me call the police."

Bennett laughed. "You won't call the police. You like 'em as much as I do. Ya know, you've got a lot of nerve to bring yourself near my children and act like you've got any sorta power over me, sporting a big ol' prison tat on your neck."

Jeremy froze, which just made Bennett laugh harder. "Yeah, you really didn't think I'd notice, you little shit? It takes one to know one."

Jeremy's hand, still on the doorknob, tightened its grip until his knuckles were white. His other hand, at his side, began to tingle with nervous energy. "You're right," he said. "I won't call the cops. I'll call Rita. And I'm gonna bet she'll listen to me more than she'd listen to you. And you'll probably lose whatever little claim to your kids that you've got left. How's that?"

Being a foster kid had its advantages; you got a sense of what shitty parents could and couldn't do to be able to stay around their kids. In this instance, it seemed to have worked. Bennett scowled, pushed away from the doorframe, and started to drift away. Then he abruptly turned back and said, "The kids, you know? They're innocent. They're so innocent. I can't believe Rita'd keep me away but let scum like you watch 'em."

"You don't know anything about me," Jeremy said, voice cold and even. "Get out."

Bennett disappeared up the walkway and Jeremy slammed the door and locked it. His head was buzzing slightly, with adrenaline and something else, something he ignored because he was too busy trying to decide if he should call Rita anyway. He sat down on the couch and weighed the pros and cons. Rita should definitely know what had happened, but interrupting what was probably her few hours of unfettered freedom the entire week for something he'd been able to diffuse himself seemed unnecessary and a little cruel. And Jeremy liked Rita. He liked her soft maternal smile and he liked her kids. He wanted to let her have the extra couple hours. He'd tell her when they got back.

He was on the way to the kitchen to get some water and clear his head when he saw it. There was a shadow on the window by the back door, in the shape of a silhouette. Jeremy went immediately for the door knob, to lock it in case it wasn't. He turned the lock at the right second; instantly there was pounding on the other side, and shouting. "Open up, asshole! Lemme in to my kids! They're safer with me than you, you piece of shit!"

Jeremy wasn't sure if Bennett was strong enough to break down the door. He backed away from it, the buzzing in his head getting louder. He could feel the pressure building in his chest, hands tingling electric. In a flash he was in the kitchen, drawing the biggest and sharpest knife from the block on the counter. He stood in front of the door and waited, imagining Bennett walking through and which slice he'd make first, in his head daring the big lout to do it, do it now and see how sorry you'll be.

He didn't know exactly what it was that clued him in. Maybe the mental awareness that Dexter had instilled in him had worked. But after a few more seconds of banging outside, Jeremy looked down at the knife in his hand and realized what was happening. And he knew this wasn't going to work, even if it was technically self-defense, his MO was too distinctive, everyone would know. He let out a big gasping breath, drew in another, and retreated, tucking the knife into his belt and grabbing the cordless phone as he went back to Astor and Cody's room. He pressed his ear against the door; miraculously, they seemed not to notice the commotion. Some kids slept like the dead. He was jealous.

Jeremy held up the phone and stared at the dial pad. Bennett had said he'd never call the police. And it was true that the very sight of an officer in uniform sent waves of panic through him, but this was home invasion. Bennett was right, there were two innocent lives here, lives already disrupted by the monster that was Dad. There was Rita, paying him ten dollars an hour and feeding him pizza without knowing or caring what his last source of income was. There was Dexter, demented doting Dexter, probably the best father figure Jeremy had ever had.

He called 911.

"Yeah, I'm babysitting two kids and their estranged dad is drunk and trying to break in…"

***

Jeremy's call sent a flurry of swirling red and blue lights and uniformed cops upon Rita's small, cozy house. Sometime between his call and the arrival of the police, however, Paul Bennett had apparently given up his quest and disappeared. Rita and Dexter came home immediately, of course, and Rita talked to the police in low, lilting tones as Jeremy sat at the dining room table and gave his statement, waiting for someone to recognize him and announce that he needed to be brought into the station, just for being Jeremy Downs. Luckily, no one said such a thing.

Once the police left, Rita came over to Jeremy and put a hand on his shoulder. He tensed a little but forced himself to look up at her. She smiled her soft smile and said, "Thank you for doing what you did, Jeremy. You were very brave."

Jeremy did not feel brave. He chewed his lip and said, "If I knew he was just gonna stop and leave, I wouldn't have caused this mess."

"Don't you worry about it. You did the right thing. I'm sorry I didn't tell you about Paul. I was just hoping he'd leave us in peace. He's got regular visitations with the kids; I don't know what else he expects from us."

She pulled out her purse and gave him sixty dollars from her wallet, which was almost double what he should have been given. Jeremy tried to give it back, but she refused. "Believe me, it's the very least I can do. Who knows how bad things could have gotten if you weren't here."

Jeremy swallowed hard and didn't mention how bad things could have gotten _with_ him here. The mental image of Astor and Cody seeing him bloody and manic over their dad's mangled corpse skittered through his mind.

"Thank you," was all he could manage.

Rita went to check on the kids and Jeremy got up, for the first time facing Dexter, who had played the part of concerned boyfriend well, was now in the kitchen with his arms crossed, watching Jeremy like a hawk. Jeremy approached him and tried to look him in the eye, but was having a difficult time lifting his gaze that high. After few seconds of silent confrontation, Dexter moved away from where he was leaning against the counter, revealing the knife block with one slot empty.

Jeremy said nothing.

He had been lucky enough to be wearing an open plaid shirt over a more form-fitting t-shirt, which had provided concealment for the weapon he had kept with him, he had told himself, just in case. The police, with no reason to search him, hadn't found it. In a swift movement, Dexter pushed aside the plaid shirt, revealing the knife handle still tucked into his belt. Dexter seized it and pulled it out, holding it up in front of Jeremy's face.

"Explain."

Jeremy looked at his shoes.

"Dammit, Jeremy."

The disappointment in his voice hit Jeremy harder than he thought it would.

"That's not the reason they can't find him, is it?" Dexter asked, low and harsh.

For the first time Jeremy's gaze snapped up to meet his. "No!" he said, a little too loudly. Struggling to control his volume, he said, "I thought about it, but… but I didn't. I called the police instead. I just… if he got in, I didn't want to be defenseless. I know what drunk dads can do to their kids, okay?"

The passion in his voice must have convinced Dexter, because he replaced the knife in its block and said, with the stereotypical sternness of a parent, "We'll talk about this in the car."

Rita reappeared and Dexter's demeanor changed, his entire posture relaxing and his tone going lighter, good-natured, harmless. He seemed the least threatening when he was around Rita.

"Are you sure you don't want extra enforcements tonight, in case he comes back?" Dexter asked her.

Rita put her arms around him and kissed him briefly. "We'll be fine. He's probably collapsed someplace to sleep it off." She disentangled herself from Dexter and turned to Jeremy, taking his hand and squeezing it once. "Thank you again. You deserve a medal."

It was rare an adult looked at Jeremy with that much trust in her eyes. It was even absent in Dexter's, who knew entirely too many of his secrets. Jeremy had a strange and foreign urge to hug Rita, which he did not indulge. He just swallowed painfully and tried to smile.

Dexter did not speak for much of the ride back to his place. Jeremy, never one to start a conversation, kept his face turned away, watching the various lights of Miami coast by.

Finally, Dexter said, "Paul Bennett's enough to awaken anyone's inner homicidal maniac."

Surprised by the humor in his voice, Jeremy turned to face him.

"Not a nice guy, is he?" Dexter said.

Jeremy shook his head.

"And don't think the thought hasn't crossed my mind, either." Dexter shook his head. "But it's not a good idea, for a number of reasons. I'm glad you recognized it, too. It's a step forward for you, Jeremy."

Unsure of what else to say, Jeremy just mumbled, "Thanks."

"You felt it, though. The need." It wasn't a question.

Slowly, Jeremy nodded.

Stopped at a light, Dexter turned to look him in the eye. "Is it still there?"

Deep in his chest, the pressure had eased, but the more he concentrated, the more he felt it, hard and heavy as a stone, pressing. It would flair again, he realized, the next time he was threatened or angry. Would he be able talk himself out of it then?

"Yeah," he said, quietly. "It is."

Dexter nodded. The light changed; he turned the wheel, looking casually out at the street. "Then we'll fix it."

***

The next night, it was another abandoned warehouse, more tarp, more pictures on the walls. It was someone Dexter had been tailing mostly on his own, with a few bits of input from Jeremy in their study sessions. A small Cuban man who had killed his child when she was eight and was steadily working up ages in other people's children. Dexter had dumped him, drugged and stupid, on a table, but that's not the way Jeremy wanted to do it. Dexter had looked incredulous, but in the end agreed to wait outside the kill room, guarding the inside of the warehouse door, just in case.

Dexter had gotten him a small but sharp hunting knife, not unlike the one he'd had until recently. When not in use it was to stay with Dexter's tools, for safe-keeping but also because Jeremy knew Dexter didn't trust him with unlimited access to a weapon like that. Jeremy wasn't sure he trusted himself either, so that was all right, he supposed.

He sat cross-legged on the floor and waited for the man to wake up. He ran the knife's blade sideways across his thumb, feeling the friction of its sharpness, even through the latex gloves. He wished he didn't have to wear them, but that damn thumb print was what had gotten him in trouble the last time, so it was foolish to tempt fate again, even with Dexter's meticulous clean up efforts.

The man, Jeremy hadn't bothered to learn his name, stirred and sat up. He wasn't bound, either. That's not what Jeremy wanted. Killing someone tied to a table seemed like a let down after all that, like hunting an animal that was already limping. Of course, the drugs in his system still had him sluggish, but it was better that than giving him a real chance to escape.

"What the fuck is this?" he muttered in heavily accented English. He saw Jeremy, still on the floor, stance almost that of a meditator. "Who are you?"

Jeremy stood without a word. Dexter seemed all about the conversations with his victims, when they were rational enough to speak to. Jeremy only wanted to utter the correct amount of words to get someone within his reach, and then let the rest be silence. Considering this man was already caught in the web, there was no reason to speak.

"I dunno what kind of prank you're pulling here, kid, but I got stuff to—"

Jeremy probably should have pointed out the pictures of his victims, but as the man hadn't noticed them, it just seemed like an unnecessary step to him. As the man slid off the table and tried to make an exit, Jeremy was in front of him, moving faster than the Cuban could have guessed. In the next second the knife was moving, swishing through the air and skin and arteries, each one giving against his blade with another notch of pleasure. He always did love red.

With the final stroke he hit the aorta, twisting at just the right angle to draw the man up slightly, look him in the eyes, which were fading from life fast. Jeremy fixed him with his own calm stare and said, "I'm not a goddamn kid."

He pulled out the knife and the man fell to the floor.

Jeremy emerged from the kill room minutes later, having cleaned and replaced the knife among Dexter's tools and taken off the plastic body suit now covered in blood. Dexter raised his eyebrows, because Jeremy's stride was a little affected, his head tilted to the side as if too heavy to hold upright.

"You look stoned," Dexter told him.

Jeremy shrugged.

Dexter sighed. "Fine, sit down and don't touch anything. I'll take care of the rest."

Jeremy did as he was told. The pressure on his chest was gone, replaced by lightness and euphoria. He was almost dizzy with it. It wouldn't last; it never did, but he wanted to savor it while it was here without the harsh reality of _What have I done? _and_ What will they do if they catch me?_ whispering in his ear.

He looked at his hands and counted his fingers and found it all so very fascinating. Even the sound of Dexter's bone saw couldn't penetrate his high.


End file.
